Three Pakistan players suspended by ICC and charged under anti-corruption code

The three Pakistancricketers at the centre of an alleged betting scam that has thrown world cricket into crisis were last night charged under the anti-corruption code of the game’s governing body and provisionally suspended.

 

After a day that began with the Pakistan Cricket Board agreeing to omit the players from the team for the rest of the tour, and the Pakistan high commissioner claiming they were “set-up” by the News of the World, the ICC suspended the three pending a tribunal.

 

Outside the west Londonhotel in which Test captain Salman Butt, fast bowler Mohammad Asif and brilliant teenage prospect Mohammad Amir are also staying, ICC chief executive Haroon Lorgat provided the swift action many in the game had demanded.

 

“We will not tolerate corruption in cricket – simple as that. We must be decisive with such matters and, if proven, these offences carry serious penalties up to a life ban,” he said.

 

“The ICC will do everything possible to keep such conduct out of the game and we will stop at nothing to protect the sport’s integrity. While we believe the problem is not widespread, we must always be vigilant. It is important, however, that we do not pre-judge the guilt of these three players. That is for the independent tribunal alone to decide.”

 

Under tougher new rules brought in last year by the ICC, the players can be suspended provisionally ahead of any hearing if it is in the interests of the game.

 

The row was triggered by allegations in the News of the World that the three had agreed to bowl no-balls in specific overs of last week’s fourth Test at Lord’s in return for money.

 

The charges were announced after officials from the ICC’s anti-corruption and security unit (ACSU) spent the afternoon at Scotland Yard viewing evidence and seeking police go-ahead. The police are conducting a parallel criminal inquiry.

 

The three players will today be interviewed under police caution for the first time. Earlier they had agreed to withdraw from the rest of the tour citing the “mental torture” they had been placed under by the allegations. They protested their innocence and the Pakistani high commissioner suggested they might have been “set up” by the News of the World.

 

While their team-mates were turning out against Somerset160 miles away in Taunton, the accused three were being whisked into their country’s high commission in London amid a flurry of claims and top level political negotiations.

 

ICC investigators, who had been examining spot-fixing allegations against Pakistan for some time, have been in London since Monday. Sir Ronnie Flanagan, the former Northern Irelandpolice chief who was appointed chairman of the ACSU three months ago, arrived from Abu Dhabito join them, while its chief investigator, Ravi Sawani, met police.

 

But despite withdrawing the players from the tour, following pressure behind the scenes from the Englandand Wales Cricket Board and the sport’s global governing body, the Pakistancamp remained bullish.

 

The high commissioner, Wajid Shamsul Hasan, claimed the players had been “set up” by the News of the World. Asked if they had been framed, he answered “yes” and suggested the newspaper’s video evidence could have been filmed after the contentious no-balls had been bowled.

 

The News of the World said it “refuses to respond to such ludicrous allegations”. The newspaper is understood to be preparing further revelations for Sunday.

 

Hasan said of the three players: “They are extremely disturbed about what has happened in the past week, particularly in regards to their alleged involvement in the crime. They mentioned they are entirely innocent and shall defend their innocence as such.

 

“They further maintain that on account of the mental torture that has affected them they are not in right frame of mind to play the remaining matches.”

 

Pakistani journalists repeatedly asked whether the team was a victim of a conspiracy and Pakistan’s sports minister, Ijaz Jakhrani, also suggested there could be another explanation for the apparently damning News of the World evidence.

 

“Let’s wait until the report comes. After that we will be in a position to see if it is spot fixing, if it is match fixing or if it is a conspiracy against these players or against the country,” he told the Indian news channel CNN-IBN.

 

After the three wary-looking players arrived to a media posse and a small knot of 20 or so protesters, officials from the Pakistan high commission handed out copies of an article by the journalist and academic Roy Greenslade.

 

The piece was highly critical of the methods used in previous stings by Mazher Mahmood – the so-called “Fake Sheikh” behind the sensational News of the World claim that a middleman accepted £150,000 to correctly predict the exact time when no-balls would be bowled.

 

Although Hasan insisted the three players were “not running away” – they will remain in Englandand their passports are being held by the team manager – they were whisked out of a side door and departed in a people carrier while the car in which they arrived acted as a decoy.

 

Mazhar Majeed, the 35-year-old middleman the News of the World alleges was at the heart of the betting sting, was arrested on Sunday and released on bail. Separately, he was also arrested as part of an investigation by HM Revenue and Customs into money laundering through Croydon Athletic, the non-league football club he owns.

 

Both the ECB and the ICC felt the intense focus on and public clamour for action had made it impossible for the three players to play any further part in the tour. The ICC was under pressure to act before Sunday’s Twenty20 match between England and Pakistan in Cardiff.

 

Sources had indicated all week that a negotiated withdrawal was the most likely solution, but a last minute intervention from PCB chairman, Ijaz Butt, threw a spanner in the works. His insistence that the players might still play was seen as an attempt to reassure the Pakistani public that it was not capitulating, The Guardian reports.